Often individuals would like to obtain information regarding local businesses or points of interest. For example, a salesman in the field may be interested in knowing the five closest restaurants from a customer site. The salesman may not be familiar with the area surrounding the customer site.
The salesman would like to reduce his travel time to a particular restaurant in order to keep other appointments. A map or address in a directory may provide the salesman with the closest physical location of a restaurant, but the closest physical restaurant may not be the restaurant having the minimum travel time from the customer site. Also, a map or directory may not be readily accessible or may be outdated. The closest physical restaurant may be on the other side of a river, railroad tracks, or other obstacles. Similarly, the closest physical restaurant may require the use of a particularly congested highway which would increase travel time.
Furthermore, there may be a few restaurants having similar travel times. The salesman may have a preference of one of the restaurants over the other, if they all have similar travel times.
Therefore, it is desirable to provide a system, method, and article of manufacture for providing individuals with user selected types of locations having minimal travel times. The system, method, and article of manufacture should provide a plurality of locations within a user selected category having the shortest travel time from a particular site or origin. The plurality of locations should be updated and quickly accessible which enables the individual to save valuable time and energy while providing informed selections.